A Vampire's Embrace (Blood Rose Time Travel 2)

Yet Holly had come anyway and here was his truth: He loved her. It seemed impossible that he’d found love again, but he had.

He took all that love and forged it into a telepathic message. Holly, please hear me. Holly. I love you.

Only static returned, a very specific kind manufactured by an evil fae. Why had she wanted Holly, though? Why set a trap using Isobel?

Then he recalled the way Cruce had looked at Holly at the start of the auction. Cruce. A mastyr vampire.

Cruce had tremendous power in his own right, nearly as much as Stone. But a bond with a blood rose, no doubt envisioned by Lanarae, would increase his natural power exponentially.

Even if he hadn’t just discovered how important Holly was to him, Rez couldn’t allow Cruce to forge the bond. The entire realm would be put into jeopardy.

As he settled into this reality, he forced himself to remain calm. He couldn’t use his telepathy to reach Holly, but there was something else he could do, something he’d heard about through the grapevine.

He opened his mating vibration and let it run at full bore. He focused on Holly and it was as though time and space gave way completely to love and bonding.

He found her quickly. But a horror awaited him. Cruce was pounding his own mating vibration hard against hers. He sensed she’d been drugged, as well, which only made sense. Lanarae and Cruce had planned this moment for a long time. Holly would never have agreed to a bond without being forced.

But her mating vibration didn’t operate under the same rules as her physical body. It was as though the moment her frequency sensed his, she opened for him. He rushed in, surrounded her, caressed her and spoke his love without having to be present physically.

She responded with a rush of answering affection and desire. Their frequencies became one, a perfect merging, blending and acceptance.

In the blink of an eye, he’d started the bonding sequence with his blood rose.

Power always came with the bond and he could sense something formidable on the way.

He waited, his heart pounding in his chest.

He drew a deep breath. Then another.

The shock wave hit him, causing his back to arch. He felt Oregis fly off his shoulder. Power, like nothing he’d ever known before, flowed through him.

He righted himself in the air and extended his hands. It was as though an electrical current kept flowing from one hand up his arm, across his shoulders and down his other arm. His muscles flexed and unflexed. His vision became sharper and clearer.

He could sense what was happening to Holly. He turned to face Stone.

“I need a lift. Won’t take but a few seconds.”

Stone smiled and nodded. “Your mating frequencies have bonded and you know where she is.”

“I do. I’ll be keeping Cruce busy for the next few minutes. Might be the right time to take out his army.”

Stone planted his hand on Rez’s shoulder. “Just make a picture in your head and we’re there.”

Before Rez could confirm whether Stone had seen the location, they arrived.

Lanarae was flying around the room shrieking like a wraith. A fury was on her.

Holly was on the floor at the foot of Cruce’s bed. He in turn stared down at Holly, horrified. He had blood trailing over his chin. He’d been at her vein when the bond must have shoved him off her.

Stone wished him Goddess-speed then took off.

It was seeing the puncture wounds and bruising on Holly’s throat, however, that lit Rez’s battle energy on fire. Now was the time to go full-bore.

Cruce would be experiencing a power surge of his own because he’d fed from Holly. But what Rez experienced felt nuclear as he lifted his hands and arms. He aimed one in Cruce’s direction and met his Invictus based red stream of power. At the same time, he aimed his other hand at the dark fae now flying straight at him.

Lanarae had a hypodermic in her hand. When his energy stream struck, it hit her high in the chest, knocked her head up and back, then smashed her against the far wall. Her chest was smoking. She wouldn’t rise again. Ever. Holly was safe from her.

He turned his full attention toward Cruce. With only one stream aimed at him, he’d barely held his own and Cruce pressed him hard. But when Rez brought both hands together, the two fields collided above Holly’s body and showered sparks down on her.